Beagley's lawyer argued that she had her 10-year-old daughter tape the hot saucing incident to demonstrate that traditional discipline methods didn't work for the severity of her son’s behavioral problems, so she could seek help from Dr. Phil. The prosecution argued that she used these overly harsh punishments—including forcing the child to stand in a cold shower—as one of her repeated attempts to get on Dr. Phil's TV show. She contacted the show after viewing a segement called "Angry Moms," and submitted a video of her yelling at her child—but the show reportedly said they needed to see her actually punishing her child to be on TV.